Microsoft Wants a Little Research Buzz of Its Own

Microsoft devotes billions of dollars to research projects but doesn’t get the kind of attention Google does for outlandish bets on the future. Now, Microsoft may be trying to flip the script.

ZDNet reported Monday that Microsoft formed a new “special projects group,” a skunk works team whose mission sounds similar to that of Google X, the Google research arm working on self-driving cars and balloons that beam Internet connections to remote regions of the globe.

A Microsoft spokesman declined to comment on the report Monday.

Microsoft has long had a research arm, whose work contributed to products such as the Kinect motion-sensing system for the Xbox videogame console. The company spent $10.4 billion on research and development in its last fiscal year, and Microsoft has boasted that it has more employees with doctorate degrees than any other company.

Still, Microsoft’s R&D efforts lately have focused on the kinds of projects it can bring to market or use to make existing Microsoft software better. That hasn’t received the same type of attention as Google’s “moonshot” projects.

The attention gap occasionally rankles Microsoft officials. At a briefing with reporters last year, Craig Mundie, a longtime Microsoft executive who at the time was responsible for research and strategy, said “it is frustrating at times” to see the publicity around Google X.